What We've Been Up To

So October really got away from me, and I did not get as much posted on here as I would have liked, but I have a few good pictures I want to share with you from the last few weeks.

Twice a month, we have "Book Buddies" from the middle school next door come over and read with us. The kids always look forward to it and enjoy listening to the "big kids" read.

 

 

During our Fairy Tales week, we told the story of the Three Little Pigs. The kids got to take turns being the pigs who lived in the straw, stick, and brick houses as well as the wolf who blew the houses down. It was a fun way to retell the story several times and get the kids involved in the repetitive parts of the story, such as "Little pig, little pig, let me in!" or "Not by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin."

 

 

 

When I had to be gone a week in October, Ms. Keeley made sure to take pictures of the kids to send me. I knew they were in good hands and seeing those faces always brings a smile to mine!

 

 

 

Pete the Cat and a Thank You!

So this week in honor of our Book Fair going on, our theme was "Favorite Book," and one of my very favorite books is Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes. And then, as I was checking out the book fair, I saw Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons, so I knew we had to have a week of Pete the Cat activities! 

If you haven't ever checked out these books, you should because they are really cute and the kids love them. Here are some links to each book being read/sung on YouTube:

We practiced cutting skills to make our own Pete the Cats. They turned out very cute, so they are still on display here at school.

 

 

We had a snack inspired by all of the things Pete steps in: strawberries, blueberries, mud (chocolate pudding), and water.

 

We practiced counting by putting buttons on our shirt and then "losing" them just like Pete did.

 

 

 

We made our own books about Pete. First was one where we colored all of the different things Pete stepped in and talked about what color it would turn his shoes. Then we made one to practice number recognition and counting by drawing different amounts of buttons on Pete's shirt.  We also played a number/color recognition game by rolling a die and coloring a shoe based on a number key.

 

Besides all of our Pete the Cat fun, we also learned more about the letter C. The kids practiced fine motor skills by picking up pompoms with tweezers and gluing them onto the letter C to make a caterpillar. These cute caterpillars are now hanging in the hall at school too.

 

 

 

And finally, I want to send a HUGE thank you to you all for our Family Fun Night success this week. Thanks to those who could donate items/money for our Silent Auction baskets. There were some truly wonderful baskets available for people to bid on. Thanks to those who were able to come and enjoy the fun on Thursday night. We had a blast! Thank you to those who were able to purchase books from our book fair. That really helps us earn more books for our classroom as well.

 

 AND...thank you for sending in those pennies this week for our "Pennies for the Playground" fundraiser. The kids were very excited to be able to drop them in the buckets and we sure did fill them this week! Keep it up next week with nickels. :)

 

Letter A and B

We have begun learning about a letter each week, starting with letter A! Each week we will do several activities to practice recognizing the letter, writing the letter, and learning the sound each one makes.

Here are some pictures of some of the things we did with our letter A.

We made letters using Wikki-Stix.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We practiced writing the slanted lines that form an A, as well as tracing the letter A.

 

We wrote capital and lower case A's in shaving cream.

 

 We wrote As with a variety of writing tools, including chalk, markers, crayons, and pencils.

 Since "apple" starts with A, we tasted different kinds of apples and talked about our favorites.

 

 

We made "A is for alligator" hats.

 

During the letter B week, we also practiced cutting with "B is for boat" puzzles.